A SMALL COLLECTION OF ANTIQUE SILVER AND
OBJECTS OF VERTUTHE WHAT IS? SILVER DICTIONARY

ARGYLEARGYLL

silver argyle (silver argyll) is a gravy-warmer made in various shapes similar
to a covered coffee pot with one handle and one spout. The gravy is kept warm by
means of hot water contained in a compartment created by a double exterior wall, a
compartment created by a false bottom or a central vertical attenuated tube or a
central vertical cylindrical tube in which is placed
a previously heated iron rod.

John Campbell, the fifth Duke of Argyll, and his wife Elizabeth Gunning,
Baroness Hamilton of Hameldon, hated the way that gravy arrived cold
to their table from the kitchens of their Inverary Castle during the
cold Scottish winters.

The Duke (1723-1806), succeeding his father, the fourth Duke of Argyll
in 1770, was the promoter of a new piece of tableware designed to
maintain the warmth of the gravy in its vessel. This, with a bit of
imagination, was the origin of a warmer called 'argyle' (silver argyle, silver argyll)
in honour of the Noble Family that first made a wide use of this device. The
first example was a gravy tureen with spouts fitted on either side
to hold a piece of hot iron, wich maintained the gravy's warmth.

Later, the system was improved upon by the introduction of a jacket
to contain hot water or an internal cylinder into wich a hot iron
was placed.

Argyles were made in a variety of shapes and sizes but most had a rounded
body and a small foot, which maximized the capacity for the gravy or
sauce.

Usually the spout was placed at the bottom
of the container, which allowed the gravy to be drawn off from
underneath the layer of fat that settled out on the top.

Argyles were produced up until the Victorian period in both silver and
Sheffield plate. They are very rare and only a limited number now
survive, as many of the early examples were later converted into
coffee or tea pots. On the left a Georgian plate coffee pot
abtained, presumably, by a modified argyle